scholarly journals Rival views of economic competition

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timur Ergen ◽  
Sebastian Kohl
Keyword(s):  
Social Inequalities ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Moral Economy ◽  
Science Literature ◽  
Economic Competition ◽  
Ethical Debate ◽  
Broad Variety ◽  
Moral Arguments ◽  
Market Organization ◽  
Political Economic

Abstract Competition is a constitutive feature of capitalist societies. Social conflicts over the introduction, abolition and regulation of market organization are saturated with implicit moral arguments concerning the desirability of competition. Yet, unlike private property, exchange relations and social inequalities, economic competition has rarely been the explicit core of moral debates over capitalism. Drawing on a broad variety of social science literature, this article reconstructs, maps and systematizes ethical arguments about economic competition in capitalist societies. We discuss six contradictory rival views of economic competition and illustrate their influence by providing historical examples of the respective views in action in political-economic debates. This article serves as a mapping groundwork for reviving the systematic ethical debate on economic competition. In addition, our map of rival views lends itself to use as a structuring tool in empirical research on the moral economy and ideational embeddedness of capitalist societies, markets and firms.

scholarly journals Justice, power and informal settlements: Understanding the juridical view of property rights in Central Asia

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Balihar Sanghera
Keyword(s):  
Property Rights ◽  
Central Asia ◽  
Social Inequalities ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Moral Economy ◽  
Social Needs ◽  
Private Property Rights ◽  
The Social ◽  
Soviet Space ◽  
Migrant Groups

The article examines how judges and lawyers struggle to legitimise and normalise private property rights against attempts by poor and migrant groups to politicise housing and social needs in Central Asia. It discusses the juridical understanding of justice and equality in relation to property rights violations on the outskirts of major cities in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. It argues that the juridical system is central in construing property rights and obligations, and in so doing social inequalities are legitimised and naturalised in a neoliberalising post-Soviet space. The article uses the concepts of ‘the moral economy’ and ‘the juridical field’ to examine how judges and lawyers justify and normalise their ways of interpreting and ordering the social world.

scholarly journals Social patterns of natural disasters: The case of hurricane Katrina

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 195-215
Author(s):  
Mirko Filipović ◽  
Sonja Žakula
Keyword(s):  
Natural Disasters ◽  
Hurricane Katrina ◽  
New Orleans ◽  
Public Perception ◽  
Black People ◽  
Social Inequalities ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
The Public ◽  
Social Patterns ◽  
Political Economic

Public perception and imagination tend to view natural disasters and catastrophes as phenomena that impact everyone equally. However, they do not occur in a historical, political, economic or social vacuum. Every phase and aspect of a disaster - its causes, vulnerability, preparedness, aftermath, response, reconstruction, the scope of the disaster and the price paid in the end are, to a lesser or greater extent, socially conditioned. Natural disasters actually replicate and amplify existing social inequalities and their effects. Such was also the case with hurricane Katrina. Black people, the poor, the elderly... remained in sunken New Orleans because their economic and social exclusion diminished their possibility to escape the disaster (the same way it diminished their opportunity to escape poverty). Had Katrina been a mere accident of geography and ecology, it would have been possible to peacefully await the resolution of its aftermath. However, because the inequalities which Katrina made apparent have deep socio-historical roots, it was illusory to expect that they would be repaired by the public policies on offer. Because of this, Katrina remains a powerful reminder to those advocating for a more just and democratic society.

scholarly journals POVERTY, ENVIRONMENT AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 399-411
Author(s):  
Jose Manuel Elija Guamba
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Paradigm Shift ◽  
Social Inequalities ◽  
Participatory Management ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Physical Knowledge ◽  
Psychosocial Processes ◽  
Shared Social Values ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Two Sides

The article discusses factors that influence the preparation and responses in the general cycle of emergencies and disasters (environmental contexts, social, political, economic, cultural and institutional) integrating psychological, social and physical knowledge about sustainability, vulnerability and risks. The conflict between development, poverty, the environment and peace has become one of the biggest evidence of the human current difficulties. Mankind has not only of the achievements and benefits of development; but also, the undesirable effects produced by this, as social inequalities, poverty, environmental degradation and weakening of the sense of community, otherness and security. For Vieira (2005, p. 333) "harmonization of relationships that humans have with nature and the obstinate struggle by the pacification of relations between human beings constitute the two sides of the same coin." The idea of sustainable development has a chance to overcome the end envisioned. But there are those who preach the need for a paradigm shift in the concept. In today's society it is the eminence of unsustainability is global economic, social or environmental. A "cultural mutation" is necessary for sustainable development if organize around the following key relationships: with nature, with time, between citizens, and with the authority of the State. Pol (2002, p. 296) warns that, you can understand why sustainability, has "... a strong load of change of individual and social behavior and therefore requires knowledge of social and psychosocial processes involved." Thus, sustainable development requires action that can be called generically of participatory management and environmental education (awareness and availability of resources that lead to the development of habits and skills), to achieve shared social values from the formulation of plans and programmes aimed at changing behaviors and eradication of poverty.

“All the World Was America”

2018 ◽  
pp. 20-43
Author(s):  
Eli Jelly-Schapiro
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Discourse ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Economic Order ◽  
Colonial Modernity ◽  
Process And Outcome ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
Political Economic

Though ubiquitous in contemporary political discourse, the trope of “security” is under-historicized. Countering ahistorical accounts of “post-9/11” political-economic order, this chapter situates the contemporary manifestation and twentieth-century evolution of security rhetoric and practice within the long history of colonial modernity at large. It proceeds through an examination of three elemental relations: security and property, security and race, and security and emergency. The security state emerges to guarantee the process and outcome of capitalist accumulation, in the colony as in the metropole. The securing of private property is enabled by and in turn reinforces race thinking and practice. And the enactment of emergency or exception legitimates the preemptive and punitive violence of the security state.

Brazil's Employment Regulation and Outsourcing

2018 ◽  
pp. 123-139
Author(s):  
Roberta Ferme Sivolella
Keyword(s):  
Social Inequalities ◽  
Labor Relations ◽  
Internal Market ◽  
Judicial System ◽  
Economic Downturn ◽  
Legislative Reform ◽  
Structural Problems ◽  
The Subject ◽  
International Investors ◽  
Political Economic

This chapter analyzes the evolution of employment regulation in Brazil in order to understand the current moment that it is experiencing. In the current political, economic, and social crisis scenario, the protection system, which is historically valid and justified by the intense social inequalities, is questioned as the country is trying to deal with the urgencies of a big economic downturn without trust of local and international investors in internal market. An intensely advanced legal and judicial system in terms of constitutional principles and guarantees faces a number of structural problems that affect its effectiveness, while at the same time, in the middle of the scenario, the effectiveness and immediacy of the legal and judicial solutions becomes urgent. This chapter finally aims to analyze, in a historical and systematic way, and through statistical data related to employability, GDP and litigation linked to the subject of labor relations, how this Latin “giant” stands and seeks the solution between proposals for legislative reform.

The political, economic and cultural drivers of police corruption

2020 ◽  
pp. 73-94
Author(s):  
Danny Singh
Keyword(s):  
Police Officers ◽  
Moral Economy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Police Corruption ◽  
For Profit ◽  
Illicit Markets ◽  
Economic Necessity ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Systemic Corruption

This is another theoretical chapter that generates a framework to thread through the context of Afghan policing. Theories related to a political economy approach to examine the interrelationship between bureaucratic agents and economic elites and the coping strategies of poorly waged public officials and police officers. This theoretical basis informs some aspects of the political and economic drivers of corruption. The political drivers specifically cover systemic corruption which is when corruption becomes institutionally embedded from the top to the lower levels. In addition, patronage, nepotism and ethnic favouritism forms a ‘moral economy’ to deter meritocratic recruitment. Moreover, state capture occurs when main parts of the state are infiltrated by narrow criminal and affiliated political interests for profit making, usually with illicit markets. The economic drivers are focused on corruption as a means of economic necessity, namely low pay, and opportunities to engage in corruption due to weak oversight or limited sanctions if detected for malpractice. The cultural drivers cover culture, motivation and the socialisation of behaviour within police forces and specific anti-corruption training that can help to mitigate police corruption.

Transnarodowa kwestia społeczna. Migracje i nierówności społeczne

2021 ◽  
pp. 21-40
Author(s):  
Thomas Faist
Keyword(s):  
Social Inequalities ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Social Question ◽  
The Public ◽  
Ecological Aspects ◽  
The Social ◽  
Global North ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
And Migration ◽  
Political Economic

The social question is back. Yet today’s social question is not primarily between labour and capital, as it was in the nineteenth century and throughout much of the twentieth. The contemporary social question is located at the interstices between the global South and the global North. It finds its expression in movements of people, seeking a better life or fleeing unsustainable social, political, economic, and ecological conditions. It is transnationalized because migrants and their significant others entertain ties across the borders of national states in transnational social spaces; because of the cross-border diffusion of norms; and because there are implications of migration for social inequalities within national states. The first section discusses the structure of social inequalities in migration and the politics around it. It starts, first, by elaborating upon the commonalities and differences of the social question in the 19th and 21st centuries and then, second, asks whether the increasing relevance of location compared to class for income and life chances has replaced voice as a main response by exit. This is followed, third, by an elaboration of the nexus between social inequalities and migration, i.e. migration being both an antecedent and a consequence of social inequalities. Fourth, the focus moves to the main changes in migration control, its externalization from border control to remote control. This is followed, fifth, by a consideration of the other side of the coin, internalization processes in countries of destination and origin, driven by processes such as marketization and securitization of migration. The second section then moves on to sketch one of the main challenges, the need to include ecological aspects into the discussion of the social question. The analysis concludes with reflections on the shifting form of the transnationalized social question. Finally, the outlook discusses the role of social scientists in discussing the transnationalized social question in the public sphere.

Hierarchical or Egalitarian?

2019 ◽  
pp. 144-164
Author(s):  
D. W. Harding
Keyword(s):  
Social Development ◽  
Social Structure ◽  
Social Status ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Social Complexity ◽  
Social Inequalities ◽  
Social Hierarchy ◽  
Historic Archaeology ◽  
Economic Competition ◽  
Grave Goods

The model of social structure in British prehistory still owes much to the legacy of Gordon Childe, for whom economic competition was the catalyst of social inequalities. Even from the Neolithic, however, control of land or stock would have conveyed status, and the construction of major works such as tombs or henges implies authority over labour and resources, even if it was religious rather than temporal. Classical sources indicated that late pre-Roman Iron Age society was stratified, but recent opinion has questioned how far back this extended into earlier prehistory. Using grave goods as a proxy for social status may be simplistic, though whether explained as possessions of the dead, debts repaid by dependents, dedications to deities or ancestors, or displays of communal wealth consumption, they surely indicate social complexity. Settlements in British prehistory or early historic archaeology seldom display clear evidence of social hierarchy, since social status was evidently not expressed in the same terms as in contemporary materialistic and capitalistic societies. Anthropological models of social development from simple communities to chiefdoms and state societies can now be seen as neither consistent nor uniform in progression.

The Political and Moral Economy of Aging: Not Such Strange Bedfellows

1992 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
Meredith Minkler ◽  
Thomas R. Cole
Keyword(s):  
Health Resources ◽  
Moral Economy ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Political ◽  
Pension Systems ◽  
Life Issues ◽  
The Life Course ◽  
Catastrophic Coverage ◽  
Political Economic

The authors develop E. P. Thompson's concept of moral economy as a useful complement to contemporary political economic analysis in problem areas involving moral conflict. Defined as the shared assumptions underlying norms of reciprocity in which an economic system is grounded, moral economy is seen as holding particular relevance for the study of aging. The evolution of pension systems, the “senior revolt” against catastrophic coverage in the United States, and debates over the allocation of health resources between generations are used to illustrate the utility of a combined political and moral economy for enriching our understanding in these areas. Marx's concept of a “morality of emancipation” is described as holding particular promise for the development of a new moral economy of old age that would move beyond alienation by giving broad attention to quality of life issues at each stage of the life course.

Ascriptive hierarchies: Caste and its reproduction in contemporary India

2015 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 228-243 ◽  
Author(s):  
Surinder S Jodhka
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Open System ◽  
Large Volume ◽  
Closed System ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Social Inequalities ◽  
Social Hierarchy ◽  
Science Literature ◽  
Social Science Literature ◽  
Individual Achievement

Social science literature on caste tends to view it as a peculiar institution of the Hindus, emanating from their past tradition and religious beliefs/scriptures. This view also presumes that the processes of urbanization and industrialization, unleashing the process of modernization, will end caste, eventually producing a shift from a closed system of social hierarchy to an open system of social stratification based on individual achievement, merit and hard work. Drawing from a large volume of recent writings the author argues in this article that this approach to the understanding of caste is based on an assumption of Indian exceptionalism. Such an orientalist view of caste also denies the possibility of deploying the framework of caste for understanding caste-like ascriptive hierarchies that exist in many other (if not all) societies. Some of the recent theorizations of caste could perhaps provide useful conceptual tools for developing a comparative understanding of social inequalities.

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